


Black Ink on Some Blue Lines

by thelastfig



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-War, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2016-12-31
Packaged: 2018-09-13 15:11:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9129865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelastfig/pseuds/thelastfig
Summary: It’s been sixteen years since the letter was written, but it never found its way to the one it was intended for. The thing about secrets is they eat away at you, not all at once but slowly over the years, and you begin to wonder, to play out the what if scenarios in your mind. Instead, David buried it away and pretended like it never existed. He should have killed it, he thinks to himself, not buried it while it still had breath in its lungs.In which David remembers his evolving relationship with Joe over the course of the war and decides to deliver a letter.





	

**Author's Note:**

> For Luxover.

The waves this far out are almost non-existent. The rocking back and forth isn’t noticeable to anyone who has spent time out at sea, and certainly not to David who sits on the aft deck watching the two lines he’s set up. The ocean stretches for miles in all directions, like a blue mirror on this cloudless day and one can’t tell where the sky begins or the ocean ends. Occasionally a curious gull cries out, circles the boat, lands for a minute or two to rest before leaving David to his solitude. There’s a smell people associate with the ocean, but it’s the decomposition of what is washed to shore, and out here so far away from it, there is nothing but a vague hint of brine. Out here on the ocean, on his boat, everything has a place. David knows the waves, what the different cloud shapes foretell, and how to react to the ever-changing situations the temperamental waters throw at him.

 

Five days have passed as he’s slowly made his way up the coast from LA. The coastline surrounding San Francisco is rocky, difficult to navigate, and the weather is often a quick changing nightmare, so David has dropped anchor south of the city. He’s far enough out the weather won’t bother him if it does take a turn for the worse, but there’s not a cloud in the sky and he’s not worried.

 

Five days have passed since Barbara found the letter and told him not to come back unless he sorted himself out. There was a wariness in her voice when she pressed the envelope in his hand, a tone that might imply she wasn’t sure if he would come back. There was no disgust in her voice, but an understanding of why their relationship was the way it was. He trusts her not to tell anyone what she’s read; David has always done his best by Barbara and she’s been the wife she was raised to be. David kissed his children goodbye, promising to be home within a week or two, and left their house behind him, a letter and photo burning a hole in his pocket.

 

It’s been sixteen years since the letter was written, but it never found its way to the one it was intended for. The thing about secrets is they eat away at you, not all at once but slowly over the years, and you begin to wonder, to play out the what if scenarios in your mind. Instead, David buried it away and pretended like it never existed. He should have killed it, he thinks to himself, not buried it while it still had breath in its lungs.

 

A soft noise startles him from his thoughts. He hears the splash but doesn’t see the fish, only the ripple left in its wake. David wonders why fish jump, why they leave behind the world they know and are born into for a brief glimpse of sky, of air instead of water. Is it to catch prey, a survival instinct, or perhaps something Darwinian leading to its death and strengthening of its genetic pool? Maybe it’s curiosity.

 

The ripples spread until they dissipate, and the ocean is flat once more.

 

Deep down, David knows why the fish jumps.

 

*** ***

No one asks why David is transferred, and he doesn’t offer an explanation. He knows some of the men of Easy company by look and more than a few by name, and while integration into a new company is not as seamless as he would like, he eventually finds a friend in Donald Hoobler. Whereas David sees this as a grim reminder of humanity’s arrogance, Hoobler seems to genuinely enjoy being a soldier. David is here for the experience; Hoobler is here because he wants to be. Maybe at first David has some romantic notion of war and being a simple grunt, but his jump into France has dispelled any lingering ideas on that front. Hoobler is wide smiles, easy jokes, and a constant happy David wants to hate him for but can’t.

 

The antithesis of Donald Hoobler is Joseph Liebgott. David doesn’t know what he has done to earn Liebgott’s ire, but he’s quickly learned to avoid the older man and keep his mouth shut when he’s around. It’s easier said than done when the entire company is amassed together in a tent camp, and being stuck in France with the enemy retreating if not entirely gone leaves them with little to do. Liebgott never passes up an opportunity to make a snide comment to David, and David is sure there’s a bet going on when one of their arguments will turn violent.

 

“Whatcha reading, professor?” Liebgott finds him in the corner of the bar the company has swarmed on this particular evening.

 

David doesn’t respond, hoping Liebgott will take the hint and leave him alone. His hopes are in vain as Liebgott reaches forward and plucks the book out of David’s hands. David presses his lips together, annoyance flaring in him as Liebgott takes a minute to look at the book.

 

“This isn’t English,” Liebgott finally says, and David rolls his eyes.

 

“It take you that long to figure that out?” David’s voice is dripping with sarcasm and it pulls a sneer from Liebgott’s lips.

 

Before either of them can taunt the other further, Hoobler appears and Liebgott all but throws the book on the table.

 

“Look what I found,” Hoobler hands David a pack of higher end cigarettes and a small stack of chocolate bars.

 

David thanks him, tucking the candy away into different pockets before picking up the book and starting where he left off. Hoobler moves away, depositing his spoils of war to the next lucky recipient, but Liebgott continues to stare at David.

 

“You actually going to eat those or keep giving them to kids?”

 

David look up over the edge of his book and raises an eyebrow, “Have you been watching me? Careful Joe, or someone will get ideas.”

 

Liebgott scoffs and David returns to his book. Eventually Hoobler makes it back over to him and he does, David looks up to find Liebgott gone. With a relieved sigh, he puts the book down to play cards with Hoobler and whoever else wanders by their table for a hand.

 

One day the company is sent out to gather intel from the locals closer to where the Germans have supposedly retreated to. It’s a pointless exercise, but Easy has now been stuck in France with nothing to do for three weeks and at least this way it looks as if they have a mission of some sort. They’re on the outskirts of a small village when a gang of curious children peek at them from behind a hedge. They are thinner than they should be, hungry eyes made larger by dark circles. The chocolate comes out of David’s pockets, soft from the heat but still good. Soon the children are crawling over him, laughing as David asks them questions and gathers the so-called intel they need.

 

When they wander off and David looks up, he sees Liebgott starting at him from a distance. Squaring his shoulders, he stares right back until Liebgott looks away and hurries to catch up with his own squad. The patrol continues until the sun starts to set, trucks bringing them back to where the camp is currently set up. They eat, grab showers while it is still warm enough out to dry quickly, and eventually stumble back to their tents. David flops down on his cot in the dark and winces as his head hits something on his pillow. Reaching for the offending item, David is surprised to see a book.

 

The book has been read many times, evident by the creases in the spine and the dog-eared pages. While someone leaving him a book would be out of the norm, someone leaving him a book in German is baffling. The only ones outside of command who know he speaks German are Hoobler, who was with him all day and would have just given the book to him, and Liebgott. The idea of Liebgott gifting David anything, even a tattered old book, is insane at worse and improbable at best.

 

The next day, after a morning of drills, they’re given free time in the afternoon. David spends his time with the new book under the shade of a large tree, his back against the trunk. It’s hot in the French summer sun, and the slight breeze is more taunting than helpful. He hoped he would be alone, away from the fray of the war machine, but there is no solitude to be found.

 

“You too good to say thank you, Harvard?”

 

“Thank you.” David says without looking up, holding back a sigh when Liebgott sits down close to him instead of wandering off. He can feel the burn of Liebgott’s gaze on him, sizing him up and trying to decipher David like he’s something completely alien and David eventually snaps. “What?”

 

“Nothing,” Liebgott says with a smirk and a shrug, plucking a blade of grass from the ground. David watches as he slowly pulls it apart, reaching for another when he’s done. “I don’t get you.”

 

“What’s there to get?” David snaps the book shut with a sigh. 

 

“Bitter much?”

 

“That’s rich.” David scoffs. “God, I can’t even have an hour to myself-”

 

“Why aren’t you an officer?” Liebgott interrupts him. “You have the connections, the money—why are you slumming it?”

 

There’s a sharpness, a slight hiss when Liebgott says ‘slumming’. David considers standing up and walking away, but he knows Liebgott will just follow him and the questions will become more invasive.

 

“Does it matter?”

 

“Yes,” Liebgott presses, smirk gone, and David finds himself taken aback by the look on Liebgott’s face. “Why are you here?”

 

David doesn’t respond right away. If their past interactions are anything to go by, this will end in an argument and David will go to bed with a headache caused by grinding his teeth in anger. Maybe it’s easier to respond, but answering Liebgott feels like admitting defeat.

 

David settles for defeat.

 

“Money is not a substitute for leadership; a commission should be earned, not bought.” He opens his book and pretends to start reading. “I’d be shit at leading.”

 

He expects Liebgott to needle him further, but to David’s surprise Liebgott doesn’t say anything. David resumes reading in peace and strangely enough, the ensuing silence is comfortable and stretches until David finishes the book. When he puts it down, he sees Liebgott has fallen asleep and takes a moment to study him. In his sleep, Liebgott looks much younger. There’s not a sneer or smirk contorting his face into something mean, and David thinks he almost looks nice. He shakes his head and calls Liebgott’s name, but the slumbering man doesn’t wake up. Huffing, David crawls onto his knees and leans over to nudge him awake.

 

Liebgott wakes slowly, a real smile on his face for too brief a time. He blinks and the smile fades, but it’s there long enough for something in David’s chest to clutch.

 

“You’re not bad to be around when you’re asleep,” David says lightly, dying sun blinding him as he looks up and away.

 

Liebgott narrows his eyes at David as he sits up. David braces himself for the inevitable barrage of insults, but Liebgott just chuckles and climbs to his feet. He sticks his hand out, offering to pull David up, and David hesitates for a second, a heartbeat, before putting his hand in Liebgott’s and letting himself be hauled up.

 

“You’re alright kid, you’re alright.”

 

Something shifts between them that day in a bombed-out farm field in the French countryside. Their walk back is in companionable silence, and no one believes Luz when he tells the others he saw Webster and Liebgott together and not arguing. The comments and offhand remarks don’t stop, but they’re not as sharp and David begins to give as good as he gets. It’s entertaining now, to fight with Liebgott, especially when he discovers the betting pool is shifting to him snapping and throwing the first punch. Their arguments can be heated, yes, but David thinks maybe what separates him from the others is he knows when Liebgott is actually angry and when it’s all posturing. Now David knows the difference, Liebgott is an open book to him with a title that is a work in progress changing from _Untitled_ , to _That Jerk_ , to _Liebgott_. Soon, the title shifts permanently.

 

David doesn’t remember what they’re arguing about, only the tense line drawn on Liebgott’s shoulders when Hoobler interrupts their ‘domestic’ to ask David is he wants to go and try his luck with the local ladies. A ‘yes’ is on the tip of his tongue when Liebgott snarls something at him in German and storms out of the room. David doesn’t register the silence that follows in Liebgott’s wake or the whispers in his as he tracks Liebgott out of camp back to the tree in the field. He doesn’t notice the way murky puddle water and mud from the earlier rains splash up and cling to his boots and uniform. What David does see is the electric anger in Liebgott’s eyes when he catches up with him, how his lips press together in a thin line. What David doesn’t expect is for Joe to grab him and shove him back against the trunk of the tree, one hand fisted at his collar, the other pushing bruises into his hip. Cold droplets of water soak through the back of his shirt, and David has to hold himself back from shivering. Liebgott’s face is inches from his, his breathing harsh and shallow, ghosting across David’s face. It is then David comprehends while he can read Liebgott like a book, he hasn’t understood the subtext as well as he has thought.

 

“Joe,” he renames the book as he closes the distance between them. 

 

Joe’s lips are chapped, wet in one corner from where he constantly bites them. For a moment, Joe is motionless, and David wonders if he has made a mistake. David pulls back, and Joe releases him to fall against the tree, bark digging sharp points into David’s back. David doesn’t look away—he’s done backing down from Joe. Joe stares at him in a way seemingly reserved just for David, before reaching for David and pressing against him. Their lips smash together, a mix of teeth nipping and biting, fighting for dominance, while their hips slot together. David muffles a gasp against Joe’s mouth as he feels Joe pressed hard against his hipbone and realizes he is just as aroused. Joe grinds against him, emboldened by the way his name falls off of David’s lips.

 

They shouldn’t be doing this, not out in a field where anyone could see, not in a time and place they could be court martialed, and certainly not with another man, but neither cares. Weeks of tension bleeds out between them as pants are undone, and David finds himself biting Joe’s shoulder to stop from crying out when Joe spits in his hand and takes them both in his palm. Pinned between Joe and the tree, David can’t move and he has a feeling that’s exactly what Joe wants. Joe’s thumb, rough and callused from months of training, circles the tip of his cock, and David throws his head back hitting the tree with an audible crack. Joe’s free hand comes up to cradle David’s head, resting their foreheads together, their gasps intermingling.

 

Joe’s name escapes David’s lips as he comes, spilling onto Joe’s hand with a stuttered sigh. He would be embarrassed about how soon he came if Joe has not followed a few seconds later, whispering curses mixed with kisses against David’s skin before sagging against him. David’s hand finds itself tangled in Joe’s hair, running through the strands as they try to regain their breathing. He tries to keep the satisfied grin off his face, but fails entirely.

 

When Joe pulls back and sees his smile he rolls his eyes, but David sees the brief quirk of his lips and the amusement in his eyes. The night marks the first time they sneak off together, but it won’t be the last. They steal rare time in France, and it becomes easier when they’re finally transferred back to England. In England, they are billeted in houses with private showers where they don’t have to be careful as to not have to explain away marks on their skin. David carries a somewhat permanent set of bruises on his hips from Joe’s fingers and the smallest of bite marks between his collarbone and shoulder. If Joe is around when an attractive woman walks by, he finds an excuse to grab David’s shoulder and press into the broken skin as if to remind David he is spoken for.

 

“What’s her name?” Hoobler asks one night after David stumbles into their shared room later than he should be returning, hair a mess and lips swollen.

 

David’s mind goes blank, mouth hanging open as he stares at Hoobler, trying to invent a woman on the spot. Hoobler huffs and flops back down on the bed.

 

“Jesus Web, I’m not blind,” Hoobler’s voice is hushed as not to be overheard. “This thing that you and Liebgott have, whatever it is it’s not my business, but you have to be more careful.”

 

“There’s nothing-” David starts, but Hoobler cuts him off.

 

“David.” Hoobler raises an eyebrow at him. “You are a terrible liar. Think of an alibi.” He turns to face the wall and pulls his blanket back up over his shoulders. “And no, I don’t think anyone else has noticed.”

 

David doesn’t sleep well and it shows in their PT the next morning. His stomach churns with the idea of someone finding out, and he curses himself for being an idiot. He takes a longer shower than usual, not turning the water off until Hoobler bangs on the door and shouts there are easier ways to drown himself. Drying himself off and getting dressed, he follows Hoobler to where a group of guys are shooting the shit with a war reporter and a photographer. They answer a few questions, pose for a photograph, and eventually sit down as Luz begins a story of his. Joe and a few others join them at some point, and David tries and fails miserably to not stare at Joe when he laughs.

 

At a pub later in the evening the din is close to deafening as they watch their company dissolve further into drunkenness and hassle the replacements. David had brought his journal to catch up on the writing he was behind with, but after a few spilled drinks and too many close calls with his journal, he decided to leave. Joe catches him before he can leave, pulling him into the corner of the room, close enough to be part of the company but far enough away to not be overheard.

 

“Hey,” Joe murmurs as they stand in a corner watching Buck and Luz swindle money out of Heffron and Toye at darts. “You’re avoiding me.”

 

Joe might be a closed book to the others, but to David in his aloofness and sharp retorts, David sees uncertainty and insecurity.

 

“Shit,” is all Joe can say after David tells him about his conversation with Hoobler. “Shit.”

 

Joe doesn’t have a chance to say anything else as Smokey announces to the room that Lipton has been promoted. The cheers and laughs fly out the window at Lipton’s somber notice they are deploying to Holland. In the coming days David doesn’t need an alibi as they are too busy preparing to jump, and once they are in Holland there is no time or privacy. David consoles himself by sneaking off to farms with Hoobler and others under the guise of patrols but really scrounging up whatever they can. The bruises and marks on his skin are from battle now, shrapnel, flying rocks and cement from Nuenen or from diving for cover during patrols.

 

One night Hoobler goes with him to sneak over to where Joe’s squad is billeted under the guise of looking for something he dropped. As Hoobler distracts the others with one of their ‘patrol’ stories, David tucks a pack of cigarettes into Joe’s sleeping bag. A few days later he finds a few chocolate bars stuck into an empty mag pouch, and Joe teases him for snoring loudly enough to hear him from across the field.     

 

“You going to eat those chocolate bars?” Joe asks him on a night when the whole company finds cover in an orchard, trees hiding them from German planes. David doesn’t respond, and a knowing smirk crawls onto Joe’s face. “Jesus, where do you even find kids out here?”

 

In the dark no one can see Joe’s thin fingers tracing circles onto the underside of David’s wrist. The motion sends something hot coursing through David, and he retaliates by trailing a hand up Joe’s inner thigh. There are too many people around for it to go any further, but David enjoys teasing Joe and seeing how far he can push him. Joe eventually huffs and pushes David’s hand away, causing David to grin until Joe leans in close and whispers exactly what he’s going to do to David the next time they’re alone. The grin slides from David’s face, his skin flushing as Joe finishes his graphic description with a leer on his lips before he slinks back to his bedroll. David needs a few minutes to recover from the lurid images Joe has painted in his mind, never more grateful for the cover of dark as he walks rather stiffly back to his squad.

 

In the end, David never gets those stolen moments alone with Joe. Joe is there with him at the medical station, holding a bandage against his bleeding neck as he waits for the medics to deal with more serious injuries. He sits propped up against the post David has been instructed to lay by, calf tightly bandaged but red still peeking through. David fades in and out of lucidity from the morphine syrette a medic pressed into him at the sight of the bullet in his leg. He is aware of Joe speaking from time to time, occasionally tapping a melody against David’s wrist, but nothing registers until David is about to be carried away and Joe must return to the company.

 

“Don’t forget to come back, Professor,” Joe mutters as he helps lift David onto a stretcher.

 

“I won’t.”

 

David’s mind is more than fuzzy, but he smiles up at Joe as he is pulled away. He stares up at the blue Dutch sky until it fades to gray as he closes his eyes. David doesn’t regain his senses until he is back in England after the surgery to remove the bullet and shrapnel from his leg. He can’t be sure it’s not from something else, but there’s a bruise on his wrist where Joe was tapping him. Pushing against it, he sighs at the small amount of pain he can feel through the drugs.

 

As the bruise begins to fade in the days to come, David continues to tap songs against it to slow its healing, to carry Joe with him as long as he can.

 

*** ***

 

The wind isn’t gusting when he begins his entrance into the bay, the water’s nice and calm despite the chaotic storm in David’s mind. There are many marinas to choose from once he passes under the bridge, and he settles on one with empty docks so navigating in and out won’t be a problem if the weather turns ugly as it’s known to do. Paying the moorage to the dock worker, he makes sure the Tasitala is tied down before heading to the front office to ask about a phonebook and a map. The receptionist is more than helpful, providing him with a phone book and circling the address on a map when they locate him, in Oakland instead of in San Francisco as he had thought.

 

“You can use the phone to call him,” she says with a smile, pointing to the phone on her desk.

 

“It’s a surprise visit,” David tells her with what he hopes is a convincing smile.

 

The smile works, age hasn’t depleted his supposed charm, and she offers to call him a cab. He takes her up on the offer, and finds himself hurtling across a bridge and into Oakland.. From his pocket, he pulls a crisp, white envelope with Joe’s name written on it. Inside the white envelope sits another envelope, creased and yellowed with age, and from it he takes out the letter written on a page ripped from his journal and a black and white photograph. David’s read the letter so many times in the past five days it’s committed to his memory once again. The photo, a moment in time once so crisp and present in the forefront of his mind now faded to a dull whisper of a memory, evokes an ache he doesn’t wish to name.

 

*** ***

 

Lost is the best word to describe how David feels after being brushed off by his old platoon and being send to a hostile Second Platoon. It’s been four months, but it might as well have been forty years as he sees how aged everyone seems, grim and bitter under the gray sky and crumbling buildings. Stress shows in the way they walk, the lines on their faces, and the dark circles under their eyes. It’s not until after they’ve showered and look somewhat human again that David sees the real change. Rounds come from across the river and no one flinches or even seems to notice; David wonders if its disassociation or acceptance of death.

 

The sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach begins when he asks about Hoobler. No one will meet his eyes, and he is eventually prodded away. David has some faint hope he can pick back up with Joe, easier now that he’ll be in Second Platoon, but those hopes are immediately dashed. Joe’s remarks sting worse than they ever did, and David finds himself unable to read him anymore, as if four months apart has translated Joe into a language David doesn’t know. He is ignored, somehow worse than a replacement, adrift in a people both familiar and foreign to him.

 

Being an outsider is not unknown to David, who has spent most of his life surrounded by a class of people he has been largely unable to relate to. David prefers simplicity, hard work to inherited riches, but to keep his head above water he is willing to play the political games he was raised in and detests, setting Lt. Jones up to join the patrol in Malarkey’s place. After another cutting remark, one David sees is shared by many, he is able to have Joe removed from the patrol as well. Diplomacy might be lost on others, but David will wield it as a weapon if he must. Even if he’s treated like a pariah, David will breathe easier knowing Joe does not have to cross the river.

 

The patrol is successful, that is what the higher ups will see. What they won’t see is Jackson dying, terrified as chaos reigns around him. David can’t stay down there, not among men who mourn their brother when he is not one of them anymore. His legs are going numb, partially from the river but mostly from where Jackson bled onto them as they crossed back over the river, but David finds he doesn’t care about cold. Martin, on his way to deliver the report, finds him sitting on some rubble, staring across the river. Grim-faced before the war, Martin’s disdain is a constant David finds strangely refreshing.

 

“Is this the welcome you were expecting?” Martin asks, leaning against a wall.

 

David doesn’t respond. He sees now the naivety of thinking he would be welcomed back with open arms after the hell Easy had gone through. The logistics of his return had been out of his hands, but it doesn’t alter that he wasn’t there when so many others were, so many others who aren’t there now. There’s nothing to apologize for as no one was getting into Bastogne; any semblance of an apology would be meaningless and fall on deaf ears. And while David does not feel guilty for healing after being injured in battle, he does hold regret for not being there when needed.

 

“Sergeant,” David finds his voice as Martin pulls himself away from the wall. “Corporal Hoobler?” Martin looks away for a moment, and when he looks back with his expression slightly softened, David knows. “How?”

 

“Accidental discharge.” Martin tells him with a sigh. “A Lugar he found.”

 

David has no words. Martin lightly claps him on the shoulder before leaving to find Captain Winters, the brief warmth of contact quickly stolen away by the wind. David finds the night’s events and Hoobler’s death to be too much, and he doubles over, vomiting behind a smaller patch of rubble before collapsing down, hot tears on his cheeks turning into stinging cold as a gust slaps him across the face. He hides his face in his hands as he tries to choke back a sob thinking of his friend dying in that damned forest. David tries his best not to fall into the dangerous, infinite path of ‘what if’, but fails as he always does. The whispers of doubt begin to circle in the back of his mind, taunting him by asking if things would have turned out different if David was there.

 

He’s not sure how long he has been sitting out there, listening to the lone prisoner they left on the riverbank, but after a while someone else joins him. David doesn’t have to look to see who it is. The foot tread is a little heavier than it used to be, weighed down by the evils it’s seen. They travel back to their bunks in silence. Despite the late hour, no one is asleep; Jackson’s empty bed screams too loud for any peace. Sheer exhaustion after the adrenaline fades captures them one by one, pulling them under. Joe waits until the others have drifted off before climbing into David’s bed. Thin before, Joe is borderline unhealthy now, and David curls around him, lending what warmth he can before he drifts off.

 

The sun is up when he awakes alone in the bed. The others are still asleep, most paired off two in a bed to stay warm, and he grabs his journal as quietly as possible before exiting the room. He spends the day chronicling the events that have transpired since he was dispatched to Haguenau, disturbed only once when the building across the river explodes. Luz comes by at one point to spend a few minutes catching him up, filling him in on the comings and goings since he’s been gone. His journal pages fill with names of lost friends and a hell he will never know.

 

Second Platoon is summoned back to command later in the afternoon, informed of the supposed second patrol. Captain Winters had always stood out as exemplary in David’s eyes, but now he is even more so. Relief is evident as they bunk down that night, and in the morning when Joe sticks out his hand and pulls David up, David thinks maybe things are about to improve.      

 

David fails to remember things often become worse before they become better. March brings rain as they begin their slow march and capture of Germany. There are few firefights but even more surrenders. The end of the war in inevitable with most of the Allies encroaching on one side of Germany and the Russian from the other, but Hitler will not make it simple for them. Easy captures towns, commandeers lodging and food, and if they’re lucky they stay more than a day or at least until they are dry again. Sometimes they aren’t lucky and sleep in the back of trucks as the wind whistles around them.

 

On one particularly miserable morning the canvas cover of their truck catches on a tree branch and rips, soaking them all for the rest of the day. Their luck further fails them when there are no open houses or barns for them to use for the night as most have been destroyed by the German army in their retreat. They are divided among other platoons, adding more bodies to already tight spaces. David finds himself on the end of the bench next to a replacement whose name is O’Something, it changes depending on who he asks, with Joe and Grant across from him.

 

Reaching into his bag, he prays the extra scarf he tucked away a few days ago is more dry than wet and will take some small amount of rain off of him. When he does find it, it’s partially damp, but it’s better than nothing and he pulls it out. There is something solid in the middle of it, and he unwraps the scarf more carefully as he is unsure what it is until the scarf reveals a chocolate bar. David stares down at it for a moment, before raising his eyes to see Joe looking at him. It’s dangerous, the rush flowing through him at a gaze he would label predatory, and he busies himself with stowing the chocolate away and wrapping the scarf around his neck.

 

‘You too good to say thank you, Harvard?’ David watches as Joe’s mouth forms a taunt he’s already heard, and he must cough to cover up his laugh.

 

David finds himself saying thank you with his mouth while on his knees in a shed they find out on patrol a few days later. There is heat in Joe’s eyes that never seems to be extinguished and any time any small amount of privacy is allotted to them, they find an excuse to steal away and relearn each other’s bodies. One night there is even a private bedroom, and David lets Joe press into him, biting down on Joe’s dog tags to prevent himself from crying out as Joe fucks him as quietly and softly as possible.

 

Easy Company rolls into yet another German town, and they’re sent out into the surrounding farms to patrol and scrounge up whatever food they can. Joe pulls David into a barn with a hayloft and lays him down in the corner where no one will see them. There’s a wicked smile on Joe’s face as he scrapes his teeth against where he has once again put a mark on David’s chest. David can’t hold back gasps or a moan as Joe licks his way down David’s body before taking David into his mouth. Joe’s mouth is as clever as it is cruel, and David falls apart beneath him, a writhing and gasping mess. Joe knows where to put pressure, how to move his tongue in ways to wreck David, how to take David to the edge before backing off so he doesn’t come.

 

David is so close, but before anything can happen the clunk of boots on the wooden floors can be heard and David freezes. Joe doesn’t stop, not even when Luz and Perconte start talking and grabbing at chickens to take eggs from nests. Instead Joe looks up at David and begins licking at just the tip of his cock with a mischievous smile on his face. David bites down on one of his fingers to keep from making any noise as Joe continues to torture him. The idea of being caught should be terrifying, but for some reason it sets David closer to the edge. He hears Perconte wander off after a farm girl happens upon them; Luz’s attempts at flirtation seem to be falling flat, and the soft laughs coming from Joe cause his mouth to vibrate around his cock and David lets a small gasp escape. They’re in luck as the sound of a slap and Luz making a hasty retreat covers up David’s slip. Joe takes him fully in his mouth once again, humming with quiet laughter and sending David spiraling toward ecstasy.

 

David smacks Joe on the backside of his head when he is able to see straight again. Joe laughs even harder.

 

There’s another barn south of town, but they don’t have another chance to steal away as they’re on the move again. Now into April the air is warm and in the sunshine morale runs high enough for song. Clouds gather on the horizon as they enter another town and are told to find rooms for the next few evenings. Rain starts falling as they turn in for the evening, and David takes the somewhat quiet evening to update his journal with everything and nothing important. He watches Joe play cards with Babe, Grant, and Malarkey, who he notes is just learning to smile again, and feels a familiar thrum of fondness course through him. It’s been there for a while, starting in England on their return from France, making itself known in Holland, and now intertwining itself around him and digging in. The feeling settles warm, if not a bit uncertain, in his chest. And then, as he has learned, things get worse.

 

*** ***

 

“We’re almost there,” the cab driver tells him.

 

In the back seat, more doubt is planting itself in David’s mind. The envelope is tucked away again, but it still feels heavy in his coat pocket. He considers telling the driver to take him back. David could sail back down the coast and pretend like nothing happened. He could explain to Barbara he was confused by the war, make excuses that would sound believable, that he knows she would accept if not believe.

 

David wonders what the outcome will be. Maybe nothing, maybe something, but David knows one thing—he will be able to put the biggest ‘what if’ of his life to rest when he delivers the letter.  And then, perhaps, the cage David has found himself in since he returned from the war too much of a coward to say anything will disappear.

 

*** ***

 

They pass through towns unspoiled by war, where every building still stands and the citizens are well fed. The children here are excited when they see soldiers, not terrified or somehow numb to them. These people have not seen firsthand the damages of war, and something about that angers David. He thinks of the lives he’s seen torn apart, the friends he has lost; all for what?

 

After the war, he’ll read about Dachau and struggle to understand how something so terrible could grow without anyone stopping it. What they find is a small satellite, one of many, and having to use the words ‘small’ and ‘many’ seems wretched in the face of the crimes in front of them. In the face of such devastation his mind compartmentalizes what he sees, and David functions on a most basic level. His composure snaps in the bakery, the numb and gut-wrenching feeling grabbing onto the tendrils of anger and fueling it as it ignites, and he pulls his gun. David struggles with putting the lid back on his anger, but he does and continues to help load trucks with as much food and water as they can find.

 

There will be images David carries with him until he dies: piles of emaciated bodies discarded like animals, walking skeletons staring unseeing with dead eyes, and numbers inked into skin will haunt his waking and sleeping mind. David will close his eyes and remember the anguish felt when they are told the men must stay in the camp until medical support can be arranged. No matter how many years go by, David will never forget how Joe collapses in on himself as he struggles to maintain his slipping composure.

 

There are no card games, singing, or bars that night. Conversations are few and hushed. Second squad drags their mattresses into one room, each silently supporting the others and all of them keeping an eye on a disturbingly blank faced Joe. David wishes he was a heavy sleeper, but he’s not and the events of today chase off any hopes of a restful sleep. Babe is an uneasy sleeper, normally quiet but tonight calling out for Julian to hold on or asking where Bill is. Malarkey’s much the same, speaking to friends who are no longer there. The rest toss and turn, occasionally crying out, but it’s Joe’s stillness that worries David. At some point, Joe shifts and turns over to face David, and the small amount of light from the windows reflects off of the silent tears making their way down his face. Reaching a hand out across the space between their mattresses, David takes Joe’s hand into his own, and it stays there until sleep catches Joe, David not too far behind.

 

Some small amount of justice is found when the order comes for the townspeople to bury the innumerable dead. Easy Company doesn’t get to see it though as they leave Landsberg for another town and then another. It isn’t until the German armies begin to surrender and Hitler puts a bullet in his brain that they feel maybe they can breathe again.

 

Easy Company is given the task of capturing Berchtesgaden, and ferreting out any potential guerilla SS pockets hiding in the mountains. They enter town on May 4th without a single shot fired, and quickly begin to enjoy the spoils of war. Liquor flows freely, and they take the liberty of racing around in racing around in the luxury vehicles once owned by the top officials of the Nazi party, bathing in water as hot as they can stand until they feel human again, and sleeping on soft mattresses with even softer sheets. The end of the war is so close they can almost touch it; there is a lightheartedness they’ve not felt since they left the States.

 

David does not deny himself these luxuries, but he never lets them distract him from keeping an eye on Joe. He watches the process of Joe putting himself back together. No one comes away from Landsberg without something irreparably broken or changed and no one more so than Joe. David feels their age difference now more than ever as at 22 he knows he sees and feels the world differently than someone a few weeks away from 30. He can’t tell Joe ‘it will get better’ because he doesn’t know if it will, and David knows any attempts at coddling Joe will drive him away. So he keeps an eyes on him and offers what support he can, counting genuine smiles and the occasional laughs in his journal to make sure they increase. For a while they do increase, a gentle upward line on the graph David keeps in his mind, that becomes steeper when word comes the Germans have officially surrendered. They roll into Austria, into the beautiful Zell am See, and for a brief few hours David sees Joe whole again, smile on his face with his eyes closed and head tipped back toward the sun.

 

There is one day of peace, one day of David thinking Joe might be almost mended, still fractured but nearly whole. They swim in the chilly lake until they can’t feel their hands and lay out in the sun until they’re dry and warm. The supply trucks haven’t caught up with their tents, so they’ve taken a lakeside resort as their accommodation. David manages to snag a room for just the two of them, and that night he lets Joe take what he needs, David pliant beneath him. It’s not the same confident or intimate touch David has come to know; some touches are too rough in anger and others barely hide tremors. When Joe falls asleep immediately afterward, David leans forward and brushes their lips together.

 

Captain Speirs has an assignment for them the next morning with Sergeant Sisk, Skinny, along as NCO. David sits in the back seat, uneasy with the task the Captain has given them, but even more uncomfortable with the distortion he sees in Joe. David understands anger, he understands wanting justice, but the war is over and it is not for them to be judge, jury, and executioner. David does not want Joe to become something he could later hate himself for.

 

“Were you at Landsberg?” Joe’s rebuttal to David’s attempts to talk him down feels like a slap.   

 

The man is inside. David watches as Joe shatters his carefully reconstructed façade and transform into something David cannot stomach. David has managed to maintain his composure since Landsberg, his concern for Joe overshadowing anything he feels for himself, but in this moment, he feels it crumble. He leaves the cabin. It starts with his hands, shaking as they light a cigarette, amplifying with a gunshot, and turns into a full body tremble when the man stumbles from the cabin, blood dripping from his neck. David doesn’t stop shaking until Joe screams at him to shoot the man; David finds his composure in his refusal. In the end, it doesn’t matter as Skinny already has the man in his sights, and David turns away to return to the Jeep.

 

David spends the night on the shores of the lake alone, contemplating the difference between orders during wartime and murder. The next day, when Joe is out on patrol with Pat, David moves his bag into the room Shifty was sharing with Popeye before he shipped out. No one says anything, unsurprised by another Webster-Liebgott argument. There is enough to do that avoiding Joe isn’t as hard as it could be, but the traitorous voices swirling in the back of David’s mind say otherwise.

 

There is a part of David wishing Joe would seek him out, but there’s a better chance of David magically accruing the four points he needs to go home. David should have known better than to hope for anything, to give whatever was between the two of them a name life it could ever be real. Those old feelings of doubt crawl back in – David is nothing more than a naïve, pretty face. It wouldn’t be the first time as David’s lot in life is to be a handsome, successful son who does the family proud. David’s life is an empty checklist of ‘should have’ and ‘could have’, why would his heart be any different?

 

The regimental photographer arrives in Austria one day with boxes full of developed photographs. David helps him move his equipment into a room as the clouds gather overhead, threatening rain. The photographer lets him browse through the various moments he was there to capture, even take a few if David helps identify the men in the pictures. David feels those tremors again, but manages to push them away as he sees faces of men who are now ghosts of memories. There is a striking image of Lt. Meehan delivering a briefing to his officers two days before his plane would crash. Another envelope holds a picture of Malarkey being carried on Muck’s back while Penkala and Compton watch with amused grins on their faces.

 

David flips through countless pictures and feels his chest clench more with each one. Guarnere and Toye standing tall in Toccoa, Doc Roe before the circles under his eyes set up permanent residence, Smokey and Popeye in the hospital no doubt penning _The Night of the Bayonet_ , Heffron with Haskey, Garcia, and Miller still looking so young before they lost Miller and lived through Bastogne. So many lives lost, changed, and forever altered by war.

 

There is one picture that makes his breath catch in his throat. David remembers this moment, but did not realize the photographer had still been snapping photos. Hoobler is sitting next to him, huge grin on his face, so young and alive; David feels a greater pain now the war is over than he did when he first learned of Hoobler’s death. They are listening to a story Luz is telling them, David doesn’t remember about what, and David’s head is thrown back in laughter. There are a few others listening and laughing as well, but what causes David’s heart to skip a beat is the expression on Joe’s face. David can count on one hand the number of times he’s seen an expression he could describe as gentle and adoring on Joe’s face – once when he received a letter from home letting him know he was an uncle and now this, pointed in David’s direction. It’s a moment in time Joe is laid bare, expression saying more than Joe’s words ever would or could.

 

There is life, love, and the sadness of death in this image, and it will stay with David for the rest of his life.

 

David takes the photo and a few others with him when he leaves the photographer’s room. He places the envelope in his drawer of the dresser, hidden beneath some books and his journal, before heading out to a crossroads checkpoint for guard duty. Rain drizzles down, enough to be known and uncomfortable, but not enough to fully drench him. He’s early, but David wants the distraction of being busy to take away the resurgence of ‘what if’ thoughts surrounding Hoobler. Janovec puts up barely any resistance in being relieved early, allowing David to hurry him into the Jeep, hurry him to his death.

 

David doesn’t remember ever running as fast as he does toward the crashed car, screaming for a medic who isn’t there. Janovec has been thrown from the vehicle , but is still alive when David gets there, eyes clouded with confusion, blood streaming down his face from a cut on his forehead. David puts a hand on his shoulder, tells him not to move, but there is a sigh filled with more liquid than air before Janovec’s eyes close and his head lolls to the side. By the time a medic arrives David is soaked through with rain and the blood on Janovec’s face has washed away. The sun comes out as they load Janovec onto a stretcher, and someone else takes David’s patrol for him as he accompanies the medic back to give the report.

 

Major Winters and Captain Speirs look somber when David relays what happened. The war is over, their men should be safe or on their way home. David trudges back to his room to shower and change from his wet clothing, mind blissfully blank until he returns to his room. He curses himself for showing up early, for being the catalyst in Janovec’s death. The ‘what if’ thoughts slam into him and threaten to pull him under, screaming about Hoobler and the others lost in Bastogne, now with Janovec added to the list. He buries his head in his hands.

 

There isn’t time for David to fall apart as the loud sound of many people running echoes in the hallway, and Joe is in his doorway, breathing heavily from however far he’s sprinted. Joe’s not alone as soon Luz, Sisk, and Popeye appear behind him, Bull bringing up the rear. David doesn’t really notice they’re there though as his eyes are only for Joe, who wears naked fear on face without attempting to hide it.

 

“They said someone from Easy was killed on patrol,” Luz tells him when no one else says anything.

 

“Janovec,” David tells them, surprised at how even he is able to keep his voice.

 

There is a moment of stunned silence before the others shuffle from the room, shoulders slumped.  When they are gone, Joe steps into the room and shuts the door behind him. David isn’t expecting anything other than Joe’s anger and contempt, and he readies himself for it.

 

“I told him to leave early.” David tells Joe preemptively. “He wouldn’t have been there. It’s my fault.”

 

Joe crosses the room in two steps, and David braces himself for a punch. Instead, Joe pulls David against him, tight and close enough David feels how Joe is shaking, how his heart is pounding. David lets out a sigh burdened with death and blame as he relaxes into Joe’s embrace, his arms wrapping around Joe’s lanky frame.

 

“I knew you had patrol,” Joe mumbles against his neck, “I thought it was you.” He pulls his head up and presses their lips together. “I thought it was you.”

 

“I’m here,” David murmurs against Joe’s mouth, hot and wet. When he pulls back he sees the salt he tastes on his tongue is from the tears on Joe’s face. “Joe,” he reaches up to wipe the tears away.

 

David wants to remember the anger, the hurt from the fall out after the cabin. He can’t hold onto it when he glances at the dresser, and he remembers the photograph inside. Any annoyance flies out the window as Joe pulls him by the wrist from the room into the hallway and into the room they used to share; no one moved in with Joe and his temper after David left. Joe takes David’s hands in his, and is only then David realizes his hands have begun to shake.

 

Joe is slow as he removes David’s shirt, peppering kisses across his neck and shoulders. He gently lays David down in his bed, pulling his shirt off and losing his pants in the process. Leaning over David, Joe brushes their lips together, one hand bracing himself and the other unbuckling David’s pants. They break apart for a brief moment for David to tug them off, flinging them on top of the pile of clothing on the floor. There isn’t always enough time as they never know when they will be needed, and David hooks a finger in the waistband of Joe’s boxers. Before he can pull them down, Joe catches his hand in his and intertwines their fingers.   

 

“Don’t want that,” Joe breathes into the hollow of David’s neck, scraping his teeth down David’s jugular and licking back up, mouth pressed against where he can feel David’s heart beating. “Just want this, just want you.”

 

David lays there and lets Joe take care of him while Joe is able to reassure himself David is still here, David is alive. Today has taken an emotional strain on both of them, and their kisses soon taper off. Joe holds David against him, fingers tracing circles on his hips and up his sides. Eventually Joe’s fingers stop moving, and his breathing evens out. David can feel Joe’s heart beating a steady song against his back from where he is partially wrapped around David; David’s hands are no longer shaking.

 

Time passes faster than David would like, and he pulls himself from Joe’s arms as the sun touches the horizon.  Joe wakes briefly, reaching for David and mumbling for him to stay. David leans over, nipping at Joe’s lips and tells him he’ll be right back. David pulls his shirt and pants back on, heart dropping for a moment when he notices they hadn’t locked the door behind them and anyone could have walked in on them. Entering his room, he grabs his journal and a pen before returning to Joe, remembering to lock the door behind him.

 

Joe has fallen back asleep, the setting sun throwing light and shadows over his face. David sits at the desk in the room, turning the chair so he can watch Joe sleep. He is so peaceful in his sleep, not angry and without the world on his shoulders; David thinks of a field and a tree in France, not even a year but forever ago.

 

The black ink of his pen touches the cream-colored pages of his journal as he studies Joe, heart pouring out words. He writes of their first interactions, of being taken aback and later charmed by Joe’s caustic nature, so unlike anyone he had ever been with. David describes his fears -- of death, disappointing others, of being used by someone he thinks he might love – and what will happen if he survives the war and has to return to civilian life without Joe, with a piece of himself missing. The photograph is mentioned, that David knows how Joe feels even if Joe cannot say it himself and David never expects him to. Joe speaks through gestures and actions; David can read Joe better than David can read himself at times.

 

In the end, David knows he will never give Joe this letter. He writes Joe this: he’s used all of his bravery in the war and can’t face rejection. In the end, David knows they will go their separate ways as living a life in the shadows is not something either of them can do when they’ve been duty-bound their entire lives.

 

David finishes the letter telling Joe he hopes he is brave enough to one day give him this letter, but regardless he will hold their time together in his heart forever. Ripping out the pages, he folds them into one of the envelopes he keeps in his journal and seals it. He writes Joe’s name in the corner and tucks it into the pages to keep it safe. Removing his shirt and pants, he crawls into bed, wistful smile on his lips as Joe wraps back around him with a sigh.

 

“Writing about me, Professor?” Joe’s voice is heavy with sleep.

 

“Have you always been this vain?” David deflects, hoping Joe doesn’t hear the lump in his throat.

 

“Better have been nice.” Joe’s voice trails off as he falls back asleep.

 

“It’s a secret,” David tells the sleeping man with a yawn, already falling back into sleep's clutches. “Maybe one day I’ll tell you.”

 

*** ***

 

The house is in a working-class neighborhood, a little aged but well cared for. He pays the cab driver the fare, a generous tip, and tells him not to wait around. The envelope is clutched in David’s hand as he takes the worn staircase one slow step at a time. A light is on somewhere in the house, and he can hear the murmur of voices. Over the past week, David has thought about what he would say when he saw Joe again for the first time in sixteen years. Now he is here, his mind is entirely blank, but maybe that’s what the words in the envelope are for.

 

“Dad!” A voice in the house shrieks, and the sound of multiple footsteps pounding down a staircase inside can be heard as well as children laughing.

 

From outside, David can pick out the voices of at least four children and the ruckus leads to a baby beginning to wail. An older woman’s voice can be heard scolding the children, and it is then David hears the voice that’s been lingering in his mind whispering 'what if' for more years than it should. Joe’s voice is still sharp, but deeper now with age and the echo of anger that use to resonate in every word has faded.  

 

“Jim, leave your sisters alone,” Joe’s attempt at discipline is more laughter than rebuke, and it pulls a bittersweet smile from David.

 

David’s timing was never good.

 

Stepping off the edge of the doormat, David bends down and tucks the envelope under it with just the corner poking out. He hurries back down the front steps, mindful of a lightness he didn’t know he could feel, as if he wasn’t aware of the weight he had been carrying around. David feels like he’s breathing for the first time, like he is surfacing.

 

David walks for a while, enjoying the sun peeking out of the clouds as it warms his skin. When it begins to fall closer to the horizon, he hails a cab to take him back to the marina, so he can exit the bay before he loses the light. The waters are calm and the wind is at his back, gently pushing him away toward the setting sun just as it kisses the horizon. He’ll sail on back down the coast toward home, maybe stopping in Santa Monica along the way for a few days to collect data on what sharks are migrating through the area waters.

 

As he reaches the open ocean, he turns and looks back at the sprawling cities around the bay. He thinks of the envelope, and wonders if Joe will find it later today or sometime in the future. If Joe contacts him, well, it’s Joe’s decision now. Sixteen years have passed, a few more days, weeks, months, or even years won’t hurt. Grabbing the tiller, he points the boat south, and settles in for a few hours of sailing. Ahead of him, a fish launches upward toward the sky and falls with a splash in a single breath.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and constructive criticism always welcomed and adored. 
> 
> Thank you TS74 for the beta
> 
> Title taken from 'Twenty Years' by The Civil Wars.


End file.
